Photo via mychacos/Flickr
Each month we put together a guide of all the theater shows we know of playing in the D.C. area. Often a theme emerges by accident, or by season (just guess what the theme will be in December). November is kind of all over the place&emdash; we’ve got Shakespeare and sex, Jews and Disney musicals. And yes, toward the very end of the month, we have a hint of holiday shows. Christmas is coming.
Mark Antony (Maurice Jones) in Folger’s Julius Caesar. Photo by Teresa Wood.NOW RUNNING
>>VISIBLE LANGUAGE: Here’s what we said in the October guide: In partnership with Gallaudet University’s Theatre and Dance Program, Avant Bard is premiering this musical for the Deaf. Yes, you heard me correctly. The show is performed both in spoken language and signed ASL, and focuses on a sea change that occured in the Deaf community in 1890’s Washington, D.C. Closes November 16. Tickets $30.
>>RAGE: The issue of school shootings has long been wedged uncomfortably in the American zeitgeist. Earlier this year, Forum Theatre explored that dark subject via the violent new play Pluto. Now Ambassador Theater is running another tense take on high school shootings: the American premiere of RAGE focuses on a high school student violently turning on his guidance counselor. It’s likely to be a difficult watch. Closes November 16. Tickets $10-40.
>>HOW WE GOT ON: From last month’s guide: Idris Goodwin’s love song to late-’80s rap marks its D.C. area debut care of Forum Theatre. The show is purportedly a DJ’s re-mix of the lives of three kids who use music as a lens for understanding their lives, as teenagers are apt to do. Closes November 22. Tickets $30-35 or pay-what-you-can at the door.
>>THERE IS A HAPPINESS THAT MORNING IS: WSC Avant Bard presents this remount of a 2013 Fall Fringe entry about two Blake professors with a thing for outdoor sex. It also happens to be told in rhyming couplets, so if you’re somewhat less turned on by poetry than the play’s characters, consider yourself warned. Closes November 23. Tickets $10-35
>>HEDDA GABLER: The always classy Quotidian Theater brings one of Ibsen’s most famous plays from Norway circa 1890 to Georgetown in 1963. Closes November 23. Tickets $15-30
>>LITTLE DANCER: The Kennedy Center has lately been host to a staggering mix of some of the hugest Broadway shows (The Lion King this summer, The Book of Mormon again next year), but perhaps more excitingly has catapulted new shows to prominence. Their latest endeavor is Little Dancer, a new musical by way of a Degas statue inspiration, already generating a good deal of buzz. Closes November 30. Tickets $45-155
>>SEX WITH STRANGERS: Signature Theatre’s play takes a cast of two—one man, one woman&mdash, drops them in a cabin in the middle of the woods, and stirs things up between them. While that could be the set up to a horror movie, the title indicates the couple is headed in a different (sexier) direction. Aaron Posner directs. Through December 7. Tickets $39-70
>>JULIUS CAESAR: A play about the quintessential political backstabbing couldn’t find a better home than Washington, D.C. Folger Theatre’s production of one of Shakespeare’s best is decked with anachronisms that make it difficult to tie the adaptation to any particular time or place. Political intrigue and assassination aside, the play is also one of the Bard’s bro-iest. The bromance between Caesar and Antony is not to be missed. Through December 7. Tickets $40-75
>>AS YOU LIKE IT: Another opportunity to brush up your Shakespeare this month comes by way of Shakespeare Theatre Company. Directed by Michael Attenborough, (no, not the nature guy, also not John Hammond (RIP), but he’s related) the comedy features all the classic cross-dressing, mistaken identity antics you can reasonably expect from a Shakespeare play. The dude really loved putting boys playing girls playing boys on the stage. Through December 14. Tickets $20-110
>>BAD JEWS: Despite the title, this is not the most Jewish-centric play currently playing (see Fiddler, below) but it aims to be one of the funniest. Studio Theatre’s traces three cousins reflecting on their grandfather’s experience in the Holocaust. Yes, of course it’s a comedy. Through December 21. Tickets $20-78
>>FIDDLER ON THE ROOF: Odds are good that just reading the title of this play will get “If I Were a Rich Man” stuck in the head of even the most infrequent theater goer. If you don’t even know how that song goes (lucky), your chance to catch up with this musical institution (celebrating its 50th anniversary) is at Arena Stage. Through January 4. Tickets $84-99
Paul Morella in “A Christmas Carol” at Olney Theatre. Photo by Stan Barouh.COMING ATTRACTIONS
Two family-fare offerings and (gulp) two holiday shows are opening soon:
>>DISNEY’S THE LITTLE MERMAID: Ariel wants to walk with the humans she’s so fascinated by, (you could say she wants to be “part of our world”) but finds that difficult to do as she doesn’t have any feet. She trades her voice for a chance on the surface. Olney Theatre reminds you that there is a surprising amount of singing for a play about a girl who loses her voice.
Runs November 12 through December 28.
>>101 DALMATIANS: This is, ahem, not the Disney version, but an adaptation of the book. Bring your kids to Imagination Stage to see if they can tell the difference. Runs November 19 through January 11.
>>THE NUTCRACKER Round House Theatre will have a version of the classic holiday story &emdash; this version is not the ballet, but a musical adaptation of the book. Runs November 26 through December 28
>>A CHRISTMAS CAROL: I spent a good deal of the October theater guide lamenting the lack of spooky Halloween plays, but here’s one just in time for Christmas. At least there are ghosts. Olney Theatre will be presenting Ebenezer Scrooge’s ghost-hosted tour of his life. Runs November 28 through December 28
Did we leave a can’t-be-missed show off of our list? Let us know in the comments.
